What a wonderful service...

On Thursday the 12th, my dad was laid to rest at Tahoma National Cemetery and we did a memorial service at St. Johns in Kirkland.

The morning service at Tahoma was truly awe-inspiring. It was a full honors burial, with an Army Honor Guard, 21-gun salute, and Taps. They gave the folded flag to my mom as a token of their appreciation for Dad's service to his country. After honor service, the graves registrar invited us to visit the grave site and participate in the inurnment. This was not normal protocol, nor was it part of our plans, but we embraced the chance. His grave is just on the edge of the trees, right near the main rotunda that looks out to Mt Rainer, it is a beautiful location. The inurnment was unscripted and we handled it with the typical Honeywell mix of gravitas and humor. My dad was cremated, so as we were placing the urn in the grave Max asked, 'What's in the jar?' and Tycho said 'Bye Grampa, have fun living underground.' Dad would have appreciated that.

The afternoon service at St Johns was also awe-inspiring, but for completely different reasons. There was a bunch of people that showed up, which was a nice confirmation for the impact that Dad had in his life. Lisa, Scott, Dave, and I all spoke and we each related the impacts that Dad on us and others. I thought we captured Stan quite well in our remarks, each focusing on a different area. That was completely coincidental, as we had not compared notes beforehand. Then we opened the floor to comments from the attendees, and that was amazing. There were bus drivers from Grayline that spoke, there were volunteers from Hope-Link that spoke, there was a fellow teacher from his first year at Three Points (and ended up teaching with him for his whole career), and several former students. There was one student that spoke of my Dad giving her the confidence that no other teacher ever did and really making a difference in her life, and she had Dad as a teacher about 40 years ago!

It was great to see all those people and hear all those stories, I am so proud of what my dad did with his life and the impact he had on so many people. He wasn't perfect, but he did lead a good life and I thank him for making me (quite literally) a part of it.

PS - The Tour de France has been AWESOME so far this year!